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DISCOURSE 


IS   BEnALF  OF  TUB 

PREACHED  IN  THE  CITIES  OP  NEW  YORK  AND  BROOKLYN, 
MAY,     18  5  7. 


REV.  J.  M.  STURTEVAJSrr,  D.  B., 


PBK8IDEST  OK  IiruSOIS  COLLEGB. 


NEW    YORK: 

PUBLISHED  BY  THE  AMERICAN  HOME   MISSIONARY  SOCIETY, 
BIBLE     HOUSE,    ASTOE     PLACE. 

1857. 


John  A.  Gray,  Printer  and  Stereotyper, 
16  and  18  Jacob  St,  Fire-Proof  Bufldlngs. 


(X. 


Qit^i 


DISCOUKSE. 


Matt.  10  :  5,  6.  "These  twelve  Jesus  sent  forth,  and  commanded  them,  saying: 
Go  not  into  the  way  of  the  Gentiles,  and  into  any  city  of  the  Samaritans  enter  ye 
not:  bat  go  rather  to  the  lost  sheep  of  the  house  of  Israel." 

If  I  mistake  not,  the  superficial  reader  of  the  Bible 
often  greatly  misapprehends  these  words ;  perhaps  some 
have  even  felt  themselves  shocked  at  the  sentiment  sup- 
posed to  be  expressed  in  them.  If  we  wiU  not  have  the  can- 
dor or  take  the  trouble,  to  infer  their  true  spirit  from  the 
general  tenor  of  our  Lord's  life  and  teachings,  and  espe- 
cially from  the  relations  of  his  then  present  labors  to  the 
establishing  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven  among  men,  these 
words  will  seem  to  have  been  uttered  in  that  spirit  of 
Jewish  exclusiveness,  which  would  forever  confine  the 
knowledge  and  the  blessings  of  the  true  religion  to  the 
Jewish  people,  and  deprive  all  the  rest  of  the  world  of 
any  participation  in  them.  Nothing,  however,  could  be 
fai-ther  from  the  true  spirit  of  the  text. 

Many  pei*sons  seem  to  consider  the  Jewish  dispensa- 
tion as  a  perfect  failure.  Their  conception  of  the  sub- 
ject is,  that  God  raised  up  the  Jewish  nation  to  be  his 
peculiar  people,  disciplined  it  by  a  series  of  miraculous 
interpositions  through  a  period  of  fifteen  hundred  years, 
and  then  broke  it  in  pieces  and  cast  it  off,  because  no- 
thing could  be  done  with  it ;  that  it  did  indeed  receive 
in  trust  those  lively  oracles  of  God,  the  Old  Testament 


Scriptures,  and  hand  them  over  to  the  Christian  Church, 
and  that  a  Jewish  mother  did  indeed  give  birth  to  the 
Messiah ;  but  that  from  this  point  the  influence  and  use- 
fulness of  the  Jewish  dispensation  ceased. 

This  is  certainly  a  very  shallow  and  inadequate  view 
of  the  subject.  It  was  the  object  of  that  ancient  econo- 
my to  raise  up  and  qualify  one  people  to  receive  the 
promised  Messiah,  to  appreciate  that  fullness  of  divine 
revelation  which  he  should  make,  and  to  become  his 
missionaries  to  publish  his  glad  tidings  to  the  nations, 
and  found  the  Christian  Church  in  many  lands. 

And  with  this  design  of  the  Jewish  Church  the  result 
corresponded.  True,  the  Jewish  state  rejected  the  Son 
of  God,  and  instigated  his  crucifixion,  and  thus  doomed 
itself  to  speedy  and  terrible  destruction.  But  there 
were  thousands  of  humble  and  devout  persons  among 
the  Jews,  who  were  prepared  to  receive  the  promised 
Saviour,  and  to  appreciate  his  spiritual  doctrines  and 
his  divine  mission ;  while  the  most  refined  philosophy  of 
Greece  mocked  and  said,  What  will  this  babbler  say  ? 
Jewish  men  did  first  receive  the  Gospel ;  Jewish  men 
became  its  first  preachers  and  missionaries ;  Jerusalem 
became  the  very  centre  and  citadel  of  the  christian 
mission ;  and  from  Jerusalem  Jewish  men  carried  the 
Gospel  to  the  Euphrates  and  to  the  Pillars  of  Hercules, 
to  the  banks  of  the  Nile,  and  the  Khine,  and  the  Danube. 
Jewish  men  did,  in  a  single  generation,  fill  the  vast 
Roman  Empire  with  christian  teaching  and  christian 
churches. 

Hence,  in  establishing  his  kingdom  on  earth,  our 
Lord's  first  work  was  with  the  Jewish  mind.  The  ripe 
harvest  of  fifteen  hundred  years  was  to  be  gathered  in. 
The  men  who,  as  the  product  of  the  long  history  of 
God's  chosen  people,  were  trained  for  the  solemn  crisis, 
now  at  hand,  were  to  be,  by  the  voice  of  the  Master  and 


his  chosen  band,  called  out  from  among  the  Jewish 
people,  and  prepared  to  go  abroad  on  their  mission  to 
mankind.  The  chosen  people  of  God  were  to  be  sum- 
moned to  come  up  to  the  help  of  the  Lord  against  the 
mighty.  The  Pentecost  was  to  be  ushered  in ;  the 
church  of  Jerusalem  was  to  be  founded,  from  which  the 
beams  of  salvation  would  shine  on  the  remotest  nations 
of  the  known  world,  before  the  men  then  living  were  in 
their  graves.  And  time  pressed — the  hour  of  destiny- 
was  near.  In  a  few  months  the  great  expiatory  sacri- 
fice would  have  been  offered,  the  veil  of  the  temple  have 
been  rent,  and  the  time  for  proclaiming  the  kingdom  of 
heaven  to  all  nations  have  come.  To  the  Jews  then — to 
the  Jew,  was  the  first  message.  Well  might  the  Lord 
say,  "  Go  not  into  the  way  of  the  Gentiles,"  they  are  not 
prepared  for  this  crisis  of  the  ages ;  "  into  any  city  of 
the  Samaritans  enter  ye  not,"  their  time  is  not  yet. 
"  Go  rather  to  the  lost  sheep  of  the  house  of  Israel,"  and 
summon  them  to  their  glorious  national  destiny,  as  the 
missionaries  of  these  glad  tidings  to  every  people,  and 
kindred,  and  nation.  This  is,  I  am  persuaded,  the  true 
spirit  of  our  text.  There  is  no  national  narrowness,  no 
Jewish  exclusiveness  here. 

There  are  several  analogies  between  the  age  in  which 
the  Christian  religion  was  first  propagated  in  the  world 
and  that  in  which  we  live,  which  are  full  of  interest 
both  to  the  philosopher  and  the  Christian,  and  which 
must  be  regarded  as  invested  with  very  great  practical 
significancy.  In  that  age  a  general  expectation  had 
been  awakened  by  the  prophecies  of  the  Old  Testament, 
that  the  Messiah  was  about  to  appear,  and  establish  the 
kingdom  of  God  among  men.  The  meaning  of  the  pro- 
phecies foretelling  those  great  events,  was  then  but  ill 
understood ;  but  we  know  that  they  implied  that  the 
blessings  of  the  revealed  religion  were  to  overleap  those 


national  boundaries,  whicli  had  hitherto  confined  them, 
and  to  be  freely  imparted  to  the  Gentile  world.  In  our 
age,  the  prophecies  of  that  same  ancient  Book  of  God  have 
awakened  a  like  expectation,  that  the  Gospel  of  Jesus 
Christ  is  to  overleap  the  boundaries  which  have  long 
confined  it,  and  to  be  given  to  all  nations.  In  that  age, 
there  was  a  providential  preparation  for  the  planting 
and  wide  dissemination  of  the  Gospel  in  the  world,  such 
as  had  never  existed  before,  and  did  not  exist  again  for 
more  than  fifteen  hundred  years.  In  our  age,  there  is 
an  equally  providential  preparation,  the  work  of  many 
ages,  for  the  fulfillment  of  the  prophecies  which  point 
to  our  time ;  the  giving  of  this  same  Gospel  of  salvation 
to  every  nation  under  heaven.  In  that  age,  there  was 
one  people,  a  rebellious  and  stifi^-necked  people  indeed, 
and  yet  trained  by  ages  of  providential  discipline  to  be 
the  messengers  of  Christ  to  the  millions  of  the  Roman 
Empire,  and  that  people  placed  by  their  wide  dispereion, 
— which  had  already  been  going  on  for  ages, — ^in  such  re- 
lations to  the  mighty  mass,  as  to  give  them  peculiar  and 
unrivaled  facilities  for  accomplishing  the  work  assigned 
them.  The  converts  on  the  day  of  Pentecost  were  de- 
vout Jews,  from  every  nation  under  heaven,  assembled 
at  Jerusalem  to  worship.  In  that  assembly,  was  the 
nucleus  of  a  christian  church  in  almost  every  city  of  the 
Eoman  Empire.  Wherever  the  Apostles  went,  they 
found  Jews  and  a  Jewish  synagogue,  and  in  that  syna- 
gogue they  preached  their  first  sermon,  and  made  their 
first  converts.  Dispersed  Jews  formed  the  line  of  elec- 
tric conduction,  along  which  the  Gospel  flashed  from 
Jerusalem  to  the  extremities  of  the  empire.  This  is 
Providence — ^this  is  God's  work. 

But  in  this  particular,  our  analogy  does  not  fail  us. 
In  our  age,  there  is  a  people  no  less  distinctly  marked 
than  the  Jew  in  the  age  of  Augustus — ^prepared  by  a 


providential  training  no  less  peculiar,  for  achieving  this 
work  of  Christian  propagation,  now  indicated  alike  by 
the  index  finger  of  prophecy  and  Providence.     As 
Abraham  was  called  by  the  voice  of  God,  to  go  out 
from  his  kindred  and  country  to  seek  an  unknown  land 
for  the  inheritance  of  his  posterity,  so  was  that  modern 
people,  to  which  I  refer,  driven   out  by  the  fierce 
persecutions  of  the  seventeenth  century  from  kindred 
and  country,  to  seek  for  themselves  and  their  children 
a  home  across  an  almost  unknown  ocean,  and  in  the 
great  and  terrible  American  wilderness— a  home  where 
they  might  worship  God  according  to  the  dictates  of 
their  conscience,  and  construct  the  Church  and  the 
State  after  the  model  which  had  already  been  shown 
them.     It  is  due  to  the  simple  historic  truth,  to  recog- 
nize the  fact,  that  all  which  is  most  characteristic  and 
most  valuable  in  American  history  and  American  so- 
ciety, is  due  to  the  influence  of  that  portion  of  our 
original  population,  which  was  brought  to  our  shores 
by  the  pressure  of  such  circumstances,  and  the  influence 
of  such  motives.    This  is  all  which  is  intended  by  the 
statement  just  made.     And  I  give  no  other  preeminence 
to  New  England,  than  results  from  the  undeniable  fact 
that  its  settlement  was  almost  wholly  the  result  of  the 
causes  alluded  to.     It  is  enough  for  my  purpose  that  it  be 
borne  in  mind,  that  God  did  separate  from  all  the  ele- 
ments of  the  old  world,  a  very  pecuhar  people ;  that  he 
let  loose  the  fires  of  persecution  to  drive  them  from 
their  homes,  and  led  them  by  his  providence,  to  this 
good  land  of  ours,  to  lay  the  foundations  of  a  free  re- 
ligious republic,  which,  though  it  had  no  model  in  the 
past,  was  to  be  the  hope  of  the  future. 

The  proposition  which  I  assert,  and  which  I  wish  to 
confirm  and  apply  is,  that  aa  God  in  the  apostolic  age, 


8 

committed  the  worlc  of  propagation  to  Jewish  hands^ 
eo,  in  this  age  of  universal  Christian  propagandism^  lie 
Imth  preeminently  committed  it  to  this  people^  which 
he  thus  providentially  planted  in  the  American  wilder- 
ness; and  that,  consequently,  this  American  people 
should  enlist  the  prayerful  solicitude  of  all  who  in  our 
day  labor  for  the  conversion  of  the  world  to  Christ — 
just  as  the  Jewish  people  were  regarded  with  most 
peculiar  interest  by  Christ  and  his  Apostles. 

It  will  at  once  be  apparent  to  every  thoughtful  hear- 
er, that  the  subject  thus  indicated  is  of  vast  extent,  and 
that  in  order  to  have  any  hope  of  handling  it  success- 
fully in  a  single  discourse,  I  must  pass  by  a  very  large 
portion  of  the  material  of  instructive  thought  which  it 
suggests,  and  present  it  only  in  a  single  aspect.  And 
there  is  a  single  view  of  the  subject  which  is  peculiarly 
appropriate  to  this  occasion.  What  is  the  function  of 
the  Arnerican  Some  Missionary  Society,  in  whose  behalf 
we  are  met  this  evening  ?  It  is,  to  folUnu  the  American 
etnigrant,  in  all  his  migrations,  and  to  plant  the  perma- 
nent institutions  of  the  Christian  faith  ivherever  he  builds 
his  cabin.  That  religious  stock  from  which,  as  I  have 
said,  all  the  best  peculiarities  of  American  society 
originated,  have  ever  regarded  it  as  a  cardinal  article 
of  their  creed,  that  religious  instruction  must  keep  pace 
with  the  migrations  of  the  emigrant,  and  that  ample 
provisions  for  religious  culture  must  be  made  coexten- 
sive with  the  tillage  of  the  soil.  The  American  Home 
Missionary  Society  has  been,  now  for  these  many  years, 
the  principal  agency  by  which  this  article  of  their  re- 
ligious faith  has  been  carried  into  practice.  With 
American  emigration,  then,  has  this  noble  Society  to  do. 

I  risk  nothing  in  the  assertion,  that  it  is  through 
this  same  emigration  that  the  American  people  is  to 


exert,  beyond  comparison,  its  most  powerful  inflaence 
upon  the  religious  destinies  of  the  world.  It  is  this 
very  emigration  which,  more  than  any  other  peculiarity 
of  our  history,  constitutes  us  the  missionary  people  of 
the  nineteenth  century. 

Let  us,  then,  for  a  few  moments  contemplate  this 
phenomenon  of  American  emigration^  and  try,  if  pos- 
sible, to  grasp  its  import  and  its  relations  to  the  future 
religious  condition  of  mankind,  and  endeavor  to  derive 
from  thence  those  motives  to  greater  efficiency  in  the 
cause  of  Home  Missions,  which  a  true  view  of  this  sub- 
ject will  certainly  furnish.  The  Jew  converted  the 
Roman  Empire  to  Christianity,  by  the  occasion  of  his 
forced  dispersions.  The  American  people  shall  yet 
convert  the  world  to  Christ,  by  their  voluntary  and 
spontaneous  migrations. 

Since  the  introduction  of  Christianity  into  the  world, 
perhaps  the  most  striking  feature  in  history  is  the  steady 
and  irresistible  progress  of  population  from  the  East 
towards  the  West.  It  is  as  steady  as  the  flow  of  our 
own  Mississippi  towards  the  Gulf,  and  almost  equally 
dates  from  immemorial  antiquity.  What  is-  modern 
Europe  but  one  of  the  products  of  this  migration,  which 
overhung  in  dense  and  threatening  clouds  of  barbarism 
the  frontiers  of  Greece  and  Rome  in  the  palmiest  days . 
of  their  power,  which  trampled  them  in  the  dust,  in  the 
days  of  their  decrepitude,  and  overspread  aU  Europe. 
And  when  Europe  was  full,  and  these  barbarous  hordes 
had  been  for  ages  subjected  to  civilizing  influences, 
borne  over  that  deluge  of  barbarism  in  the  ark  which 
God  had  provided — the  Christian  Church — then  Ame- 
rica was  discovered,  and  laid  open  by  an  improved  art 
of  navigation  to  the  colonial  enterprises  of  Europe. 
The  ocean  was  bridged,  and  the  mighty  human  stream 


io 

rolled  on  towards  the  West  without  obstruction.  An 
unpeopled  continent  opened  its  bosom  to  the  coming 
emigrant  It  ig  now  more  than  three  hundred  years 
since  emigrants  from  all  the  principal  nations  of  Europe 
have  been  taking  possession  of  this  new  home  of  the 
human  race  in  the  West.  Nearly  all  the  principal  na- 
tions of  Christendom  have  participated,  in  greater  or 
less  degree,  in  the  movement ;  and  the  Atlantic  Ocean, 
before  unvisited  by  the  most  adventurous  mariner — ex- 
cept along  its  eastern  shores — has  become  the  great 
highway  of  the  world. 

In  the  early  part  of  the  seventeenth  century,  the 
eastern  shores  of  the  United  States  began  to  receive  an 
European  population,  mostly  from  England,  and  from 
these  beginnings  originated  a  series  of  providential  de- 
velopments unprecedented  in  the  history  of  the  world. 
The  emigrants  were  largely  the  descendants  of  those 
same  Saxons,  who,  more  than  a  thousand  years  ago,  in- 
vaded England  as  a  band  of  barbarian  pirates.  But 
when  they  reach  our  shores  they  are  barbarians  and 
pirates  no  longer.  They  bring  to  the  inhospitable 
wilderness,  the  highest  culture  of  the  age  and  the  purest 
religious  faith  on  earth.  Here  they  form  a  community 
in  the  wilderness.  Soon,  the  wilderness  disappears  be- 
fore them.  The  Atlantic  slope  of  the  continent  is  a 
garden,  the  AUeghanies  are  crossed,  and  a  multitudi- 
nous emigration  from  the  older  settlements  spreads 
itself  over  the  magnificent  central  valley  of  North 
America.  Here  the  most  adventurous  emigrant  ima- 
gined that  the  ultimate  destination  of  this  wondrous 
human  flood  was  reached,  that  to  fill  all  this  great  val- 
ley with  a  civilized  and  almost  numberless  population, 
was  all  that  remained  to  be  done.  But  how  great  the 
mistake!  The  very  men,  who  began  the  settlement 
of  the  Mississippi,  lived  to  see  the  barriers  of  the 


11 

Rocky  Mountains  crossed,  and  tlie  same  human  de- 
luge, spreading  itself  along  the  shores  of  the  Pacific ; 
and  American  emigration  can  now  as  easily  fill  our 
whole  national  domain,  from  ocean  to  ocean,  as,  in  their 
season,  it  could  people  Vermont  or  Western  New  York. 
The  Anorlo  American  emisrrant  holds  North  America  in 
his  gi'asp.     And  is  this  the  end  ?     Have  we  at  last 
reached  the  final  results  of  European,  and  especially  of 
English  and  American  emigration  ?     If  with  a  popula- 
tion of  twenty  three  millions  we  seize  with  such  vigor 
on  the  unpeopled  lands  of  the  earth,  what  should  we 
not  achieve  with  a  population  of  two  hundred  millions^ 
extending  from  the  Atlantic  to  the  Pacific  ?     Are  we 
not   dealing,  then,  with  a  world  phenomenon  rather 
than  with  one  which  belongs  alone  to  North  America  ? 
In  order  to  do  any  justice  to  this  theme,  I  must  be 
indulged  in  a  few  numerical  calculations.     It  is  with  un- 
feigned sorrow,  that  I  perceive  that  I  can  not,  in  accord- 
ance with  truth,  found  these  calculations  on  the  actual 
population  of  our  whole  country.     But  I  am  compelled 
to  acknowledge,  that  there  could  be  no  appropriateness 
to  my  subject  in  any  estimates  founded  on  such  a  basis. 
I  can  not  shut  my  eyes  to  the  fact  that  the  cruel  and 
unchristian   system   of   oppression,  which  has  gained 
possession  of  fifteen  States  of  our  beloved  confedera- 
tion, has,  to  a  great  extent,  disqualified  them  to  take 
their  part  in  this  missionary  work,  which  the  Lord  hath 
allotted  to  the  American  people.     Instead  of  aiding  in 
planting  Christian   churches  in  regions  beyond,  they 
have  need,  even  now,  of  an  expensive  system  of  mis- 
sionary effort,  to  rebuild  those  which  this  abomination 
hath  made  desolate  in  generations  past,  and  is  making 
desolate  in  the  present.     Their  migrations  are,  to  a  won- 
derful extent,  not  the  migrations  of  intelligence,  but  of 
ignorance  ;  the  wilderness  is  seldom  made  glad  by  their 


12 

coming;  tlie  institutions  of  free  instruction  and  free 
worship  spring  up  but  very  sparsely  along  their  path- 
way. With  few  and  rare,  though  noble  exceptions — 
with  some  of  whom  it  has  been  my  own  privilege  to 
cooperate — they  do  not  carry  abroad  either  religion  or 
freedom.  The  greatest  danger  of  our  country  is,  that 
vast  regions  of  our  virgin  soil,  now  enjoying  Nature's 
freedom,  will  be  overrun  by  that  dark  system  of  slavery, 
which  this  portion  of  our  country  i;urtures  at  home, 
and  disseminates  abroad.  I  say  not  these  things  be- 
cause I  love  to  say  them,  but  because  truthfulness  to 
my  subject  requires  it ;  and  this  I  will  not  violate  in  a 
vain  attempt  "to  conceal  that  shame  of  my  own  dear 
country,  which  has  already  fixed  the  gaze  of  an  as- 
tonished world.  If  these  States  of  our  Union  ever 
bear  their  part  in  fulfilling  our  great  religious  destiny, 
it  will  be  after  that  system  of  oppression,  so  fatally  in 
conflict  with  our  origin,  our  history,  and  our  religion, 
shall  have  been  completely  swept  away.  Such  a  day, 
I  trust,  is  coming.    The  Lord  hasten  it  in  his  time  ! 

We  must,  therefore,  confine  our  view  to  the  sixteen 
non-slaveholding  States.  For  obvious  reasons,  un- 
necessary to  be  particularized,  we  shall  also  leave  out 
of  our  estimate  the  colored  population  of  the  Free 
States.  It  is,  in  them  all,  too  small  to  be  a  very  in- 
fluential element,  and  in  many  of  them,  is  rather  di- 
minishing than  increasing. 

The  free  white  population  of  the  Free  States  was  by 
the  census  of  1850,  in  round  numbers,  13,000,000.  The 
population  of  the  same  States  in  1790  was,  1,900,000. 
One  may  easily  satisfy  himself  from  these  data,  that  the 
rate  of  increase  for  this  period  of  sixty  years  was  more 
than  38  per  cent,  for  each  ten  yeai's.  It  is  also  worthy 
of  remark,  that  from  1830  to  1840,  the  ratio  was  above 
39  per  cent ;    and  from  1840  to  1850,  almost  40  per 


13 

cent ;  showing,  thus,  an  increasing  rather  than  a  dimin- 
ishing rate  of  progress.  There  is  no  reason  to  doubt, 
that  nearly  the  same  ratio  of  increase  extends  far  back 
into  the  colonial  period — probably  to  the  very  founding 
of  the  colonies ;  but  there  are  no  data  for  ascertaining 
this  point  with  accuracy. 

From  the  date  of  the  last  census  to  the  year  two 
thousand,  is  a  period  of  one  hundred  and  fifty  years. 
Let  us,  therefore,  assume  as  a  basis  of  calculation 
13,000,000,  as  the  free  white  population  of  the  Free 
States,  in  1850.  Let  us  take  as  the  ratio  of  increase, 
not  38  per  cent,  which  is  the  actual  ratio  of  the  last 
sixty  yeai^,  but  33^  per  cent,  which  is  less  than  the 
ratio  of  increase  of  our  whole  population,  certainly  since 
the  Ke volution,  and  probably  from  the  very  founding 
of  the  Colonies.  With  these  data,  let  us  carry  our  esti- 
mate forward  for  a  period  of  one  hundred  and  fifty 
years,  or  till  A.D.  2,000.  The  time  is  short.  There  may 
be  those  sitting  on  these  seats  to-night  who  will  behold 
the  faces  of  some  who  will  witness  its  completion ;  and 
yet  the  result  is  overwhelming.  We  are  almost  afraid 
to  announce  it.  It  is  very  little  short  of  one  thousand 
mUlions — equal  to  the  present  estimated  population  of 
the  whole  earth.  This  is  not  given  as  a  prophecy  of  the 
fature,  or  even  as  a  proximate  prophecy.  But  it  is  given 
as  showing  the  magnitude  of  that  force  with  which  we 
are  dealing,  in  our  Home  Missionary  enterprise.  I  wish 
also  to  show,  that  in  our  ordinary  conceptions  of  this 
subject  we  set  much  too  narrow  limits  for  the  probable 
future  expansion  of  this  amazing  force. 

The  supposed  counteracting  causes  which  would,  on  a 
superficial  view  of  this  subject,  lead  us  to  set  aside  the 
astounding  result  just  given,  as  of  no  practical  value, 
are  three,  and  only  three — want  of  room,  failure  of 


14 

foreign  immigration,  and  a  gradual  deterioration  of  the 
average  character  of  our  people. 

As  to  the  first  of  these  causes  of  limitation,  it  is  to  be 
remembered  that  our  question  is  not  how  far  the  Amer- 
ican Union  will  extend,  or  how  great  a  nation  the 
United  States  will  become.  That  is  a  question  which 
no  human  sagacity  can  decide;  and  with  which  our 
present  subject  and  this  occasion  have  nothing  at  all  to 
do.  In  regard  to  this  matter,  we  are  engaged  in  a 
political  experiment  which  has  no  precedent  in  the 
past;  and  the  world,  philosophers  and  all,  will  be 
obliged  patiently  to  wait  for  the  issue.  But  our  inquiry 
relates  to  the  extension  of  a  population  having  certain 
religious  and  social  characteristics,  and  bearing  the 
moral  lineage  of  the  Pilgrinjs  of  the  Mayflower. 

It  is  also  to  be  remembered,  that  our  question  is  to  be 
judged  of,  not  in  view  of  the  tardy  movements  of  by- 
gone ages,  but  in  view  of  the  quickened  and  constantly 
quickening  movement  of  the  nineteenth  century.  Our 
instruments  of  locomotion  and  communication  are  com- 
mensurate with  the  resources  of  our  planet.  While  I 
am  speaking,  preparations  are  in  progress  for  uniting 
Europe  and  America  in  marriage,  by  the  telegraph  wire. 
The  iron  track  of  the  steam  chariot  will  soon  be  con- 
tinuous, from  the  Hudson  to  the  Columbia,  and  from  the 
English  Channel  to  the  Yellow  Sea.  With  the  control 
of  such  instruments  of  locomotion,  it  is  in  the  power  of 
a  people  such  as  now  inhabits  these  States,  to  expand 
itself  upon  any  unoccupied  lands  on  the  face  of  the 
whole  earth.  Our  question  then  is  not  what  unoccupied 
room  there  is  in  our  country,  or  in  North  America,  or 
even  in  all  America,  but  on  the  globe !  How  little 
danger  there  is,  then,  that  any  people  having  the  will 
and  the  power  to  expand  itself  over  an  unpeopled 
world,  will  be  restrained  by  want  of  room.     What  un- 


15 

told  millions  may  yet  find  room  in  our  own  national  do- 
main. The  wildest  enthusiast  who  has  spoken  on  this  sub- 
ject after  his  first  tour  in  the  West,  has  never  half  reached 
the  truth.     One  will  be  much  more  likely,  indeed,  to 
appear  as  an  enthusiast,  after  a  sober  residence  of  a 
quarter  of  a  century  in  the  great  valley,  than  after  a 
single  autumnal  tour.     Of  the  capabilities  of  our  great 
central  valley  for  affording  the  materials  of  human  sub- 
sistence and  wealth,  the  half  has  never  yet  been  told, 
and  never  will  be,  till  we  are  all  in  our  graves.  And  what 
of  all  our  Pacific  slope  ?    And  what  of  all  the  rest  of 
North  America,  so  far  as  now  unoccupied — or  held  by 
peoples  utterly  incapable  of  retaining  it  for  a  moment, 
against  the  competition  of  an  energetic,  free,  and  highly 
civilized  people?     And  what  of  all  South  America, 
either  in  the  wildness  of  nature,  or  held  by  peoples 
who  have  not  the  energy,  the  civilization,  or  the  arts, 
to  subdue  and  use  it,  in  five  centuries  ?    There  is  no  occu- 
pancy of  South  America,  which  can  present  any  obstacles 
to  an  energetic  and  free  people,  invading  it,  not  by  the 
barbarous  battalions  of  the  fiUibuster,  but  by  the  arts  of 
peaceful  industry.    Let  us  take,  as  an  illustration,  the 
empire  of  Brazil.     Considered  in  respect  to  its  territory, 
its  climate,  and  its  soil,  it  is  perhaps  the  most  magnifi- 
cent national  domain  on  earth.     Its  territory  exceeds  in 
extent  the  whole  present  territory  of  the  United  States, 
by  37,000  square  miles.     Its  settlement  dates  nearly 
one  hundred  years  prior  to  the  settlement  of  the  United 
States.     And  yet,  its  present  population  is  only  about 
six  millions.    And  of  these  six  millions,  three  millions 
are  Negro  slaves ;  two  millions  more  are  of  the  various 
cross  races,  of  the  Portuguese,  the  Negro,  and  the  Indian  ; 
and  only  one  million  are  of  full  European  blood.    The 
increase  of  its  population  is  scarcely  greater  than  that 
of  the  overgrown  and  decaying  monarchies  of  Europe. 


16 

What  is  the  probability  that  such  a  nation  can  hold 
that  vast  territory  against  the  peaceful  spread,  and 
healthful,  natural  growth  of  a  free  and  enlightened  peo- 
ple, armed  with  all  the  appliances  of  art,  industry,  and 
instruction,  and  taking  possession  of  the  earth,  not  in  the 
name  of  any  earthly  majesty,  but  in  the  name  of  free- 
dom, of  religion,  and  of  God  ?  And  yet,  this  is  but  a 
specimen  of  every  inch  of  American  soil,  not  already 
occupied  by  men  who  speak  the  English  tongue,  and 
love  English-born  freedom,  and  the  faith  of  English 
Protestantism. 

America,  then,  from  the  Arctic  seas  to  Cape  Horn,  is 
open  to  the  growth  of  a  free  religious  people,  such  as 
our  fathers  planted  on  these  Atlantic  shores.  I  deem  it  no 
exaggeration  to  say,  that  if  we  are  looking  for  room  into 
which  to  expand  our  growth,  for  a  hundred  and  fifty 
years  to  come,  America  alone,  will  afford  accommoda- 
tions, and  a  magnificent  home,  for  more  than  one  thousand 
millions — the  result  of  our  numerical  calculation.  And 
what  of  all  the  thousand  islands  of  the  Pacific,  whose  na- 
tive population,  in  the  loveliest  climate  of  the  earth,  is 
slowly  melting  away,  before  the  vices  of  barbarism,  and 
leaving  them  almost  vacant  to  the  hand  of  the  civilized, 
and  christian  emigrant  ?  And  what  of  the  almost  con- 
tinental group,  which  divides  the  Pacific  from  the  In- 
dian Ocean,  with  all  their  vast  resources  of  agricultural 
and  mineral  wealth  ?  And  what  of  all  Africa,  just  be- 
ginning to  be  opened  to  the  geogi-apher,  still  almost  a 
wilderness  ?  And  what  of  vast  regions  of  Asia  herself, 
once  swarming  with  uncounted  millions,  now  almost  as 
desolate  as  the  American  wilds  ? 

I  know,  much  of  this  unoccupied  land  is  desert — 
much  of  it  unfit  for  the  home  of  a  civilized  and  enter- 
prising people,  on  account  of  a  malarious  atmosphere. 
But  when  you  have  made  all  these  allowances,  and 


17 

every  other  which  the  case  requires,  it  seems  to  me,  that 
the  limit  which  will  check  the  increase  of  a  people,  full 
of  the  vital  energy  of  freedom  and  pure  religion,  is  too 
remote  to  create  much  present  apprehension,  or  much 
to  modify  our  estimates  of  the  future,  for  a  period  not 
longer  than  one  hundred  and  fifty  years. 

The  truth  on  this  subject  is  not  to  be  seen  in  the  ex- 
perience of  the  past,  but  in  the  clear  prophecy  of  the 
future.  In  the  past,  man  has  never  been  able  to  people 
the  earth.  The  causes  which  have  prevented,  though 
full  of  interest,  would  open  too  vast  a  field  for  this  oc- 
casion. The  fact  is  obvious.  Here  and  there  have  been 
found  spots  of  limited  extent,  enjoying  what  is  called 
civilization,  and  with  a  dense  population ;  while  nint; 
tenths  of  the  whole  world  has  been,  in  all  past  time, 
peopled  by  a  few  scattered  barbarians,  or  lying  in  deso- 
lation, untrodden  by  human  feet.  This  will  not  last  for- 
ever. God  will  yet  raise  up  a  generation  strong  enough 
to  grasp  and  use  this  earth,  which  he  hath  given  to 
man.  We  are  not  without  our  hopes  that  he  has 
already  done  so.  If  so,  we  need  have  no  fear  that  there 
is  not  ample  room  for  its  expansion. 

But  perhaps  it  will  seem  to  some,  that  though 
there  is  ample  room  in  the  unpeopled  earth  for  all  these 
millions,  yet  the  phenomenon  of  Anglo  American  in- 
crease and  expansion  is  necessarily  temporary  and  tran- 
sient, because  due  to  causes  which  must  soon  cease 
to  act,  and  that  the  progress  of  our  population  will  then 
only  be  such  as  has  been  exhibited  by  other  lands,  and 
in  other  times.    Let  us  then  inquire  : 

What  are  the  causes  of  this  wonderful  growth  ? 

It  is  obvious,  in  the  first  place,  that  it  is  not  caused 
solely  by  the  mere  abundance  of  cheap  and  fertile  land. 
Thomas  Carlyle  is  reported  to  have  said,  in  conversa- 
2 


18 

tion  with  an  American :  "The  secret  of  your  prosperity 
is  plenty  of  cheap  and  fertile  land."  The  remark  may 
.be  worthy  of  the  transcendental  mystic,  but  certainly  is 
not  worthy  of  the  sound  practical  philosopher.  Many 
other  modern  nations  have  been,  or  are  now  in  circum- 
stances as  favorable  in  this  respect  as  ourselves,  and  yet 
in  our  case  only  has  this  result  followed. 

Of  the  maritime  powers  of  Europe,  England  was  al- 
most the  last  in  the  race  of  discovery,  and  that  in  an 
age  when  discovery  gave  little  to  the  lands  discovered ; 
yet  England  alone  has  succeeded  in  transplanting  civil- 
ization into  the  wilderness.  One  hundred  years  ago, 
France  had  a  far  better  prospect  of  planting  a  mighty 
empire  in  America  than  England.  From  the  mouth  of 
the  St.  Lawrence  to  the  mouth  of  the  Mississppi,  all  was 
hers.  The  French  mind  was  full  of  the  conception  of  a 
vast  Gallic  empire  in  America,  and  was  exerting  its  best 
energies  for  its  realization.  But  where  is  the  French 
empire  in  America  now  ?  How  few  the  foot-prints 
of  the  French  colonist !  The  very  language  of  France, 
with  all  its  power  to  fascinate,  is  perishing  from  the 
Continent.  It  furnished,  indeed,  a  considerable  portion 
of  our  geographical  nomenclature ;  but  the  names  de- 
rived from  that  source  are  now  so  Anglicized,  both  in 
form  and  sound,  that  a  Frenchman  would  seldom  recog- 
nize them. 

And  the  failure  of  French  colonization  in  America  is 
not  the  mere  fortune  of  war.  Notwithstanding  the 
transfer  of  Canada  to  the  British  crown,  the  large 
French  population  of  that  colony  have  had  unlimited 
freedom  of  growth  and  expansion.  But  where  are  their 
colonies?  The  French  philosopher,  De  Tocqueville, 
says  of  them:  "Wherever  the  French  settlers  were  nu- 
merically weak  and  partially  established,  they  have 
disappeared.     Those  who  remain  are  collected  on  a 


19 

small  extent  of  country,  and  are  now  subject  to  other 
laws.  The  400,000  French  of  Lower  Canada  constitute 
at  the  present  time,  the  remnant  of  an  old  nation,  lost 
in  the  midst  of  a  new  people.  A  foreign  population  is 
increasing  around  them  unceasingly  on  all  sides,  and  al- 
ready penetrates  among  the  ancient  masters  of  the 
country,  predominates  in  their  cities,  and  corrupts  their 
language."  He  elsewhere  states  that  this  remnant  of  the 
old  French  colony  is  already  experiencing  the  evils  of  an 
overgrown  population,  almost  as  much  as  the  old  nations 
of  Europe  ;  yet  nothing  can  quicken  their  enterprise  to 
spread  themselves  abroad  over  an  open  continent,  after 
the  manner  of  their  English  and  American  neighbors. 

Eussia  has  no  lack  of  cheap  and  fertile  land  ;  but  the 
increase  of  her  population,  except  by  annexation,  is 
scarcely,  if  at  all,  more  rapid  than  that  of  England  her- 
self. Spain  had  possession  of  Mexico  a  century,  and  of 
Peru  three  quarters  of  a  century,  before  the  Pilgrims  set 
their  feet  on  Plymouth  Kock ;  yet  the  Mexico  of  the  year 
1850  is  not  more  civilized,  and  scarcely  more  populous, 
than  the  Mexico  of  Montezuma ;  and  the  Peru  of  our  day 
has  no  reason  to  exult  in  a  comparison  with  the  Peru  of 
the  Incas.  Brazil  has  been  longer  under  the  hand  of 
the  European  colonist  than  the  United  States.  Yet, 
with  a  territory  larger  and  more  magnificent  in  its  na- 
tural features  than  ours,  it  has  only  one  million  of  Eu- 
ropean inhabitants. 

There  is,  then,  something  here  besides  "  plenty  of  fer- 
tile and  cheap  land."  What  is  it  that  has  given  to  the 
English  settlements  everywhere,  and  to  the  United 
States  in  particular,  this  amazing  preponderance  over 
all  the  other  colonial  enterprises  of  modern  times,  I  may 
say  with  equal  truth,  of  all  times.  For  the  phenome- 
na of  American  emigration  are  entirely  unprecedented 
in  the  history  of  the  world,  ancient  or  modern.     What 


20 

then  are  its  causes  ?  Are  they  pernianent  or  transient  ? 
If  they  are  transient,  the  results  would  be  of  great  inter- 
est. But  if  they  are  permanent,  the  destiny  of  an  un- 
peopled world  is  in  them.  I  claim  that  they  are,  or,  by 
the  blessing  of  God  on  our  endeavors,  may  be,  as  per- 
manent as  our  mountains  and  our  rivers.  What,  then, 
are  they  ? 

Though  to  a  superficial  view  the  causes  appear  to  be 
various,  yet  when  traced  back  by  a  careful  analysis  to 
their  source,  they  are  all  found  to  be  emanations  from 
one  single  moral  force — the  cha/raotei'ietic  religious  sys- 
tem of  the  JEhglish  dissenters  of  the  seventeenth  century. 
Despotism  could  not  endure  these  principles,  and 
drove  them  out  with  fire  and  faggot  from  the  Old 
World,  and  in  so  doing,  planted  the  seeds  of  a  world- 
wide freedom  in  the  New.  The  Church  of  God  could 
not  be  planted  in  Egypt ;  and  therefore  God  suffered 
Pharaoh  to  drive  out  Israel  by  intolerable  oppression, 
that  he  might  plant  it  in  the  promised  land. 

The  causes  of  American  growth  which  strike  the  eye 
are  chiefly  three. 

1.  The  moral  dignity  and  purity  of  the  christian 
family.  It  is  the  complaint  of  the  philosophic  and  can- 
did I)e  Tocqueville,  that  wherever  Frenchmen  have 
formed  settlements  in  the  neighborhood  of  barbarous 
native  tribes,  they  have  uniformly  intermarried  with 
them,  and  instead  of  making  Frenchmen  of  these  na- 
tives, they  have  themselves  become  savages.  The  same 
language  may  be  applied,  with  equal  force  and  justice, 
to  the  colonial  settlements  which  have  emanated  from 
all  Catholic  Europe.  De  Tocqueville  could  discern  this 
fact  and  its  sorrowful  consequences ;  but  he  does  not 
appear  to  discern  its  cause.  That  cause  is  found  in  the 
Roman  Catholic  doctrine  of  the  superior  sanctity  of  a 
state  of  celibacy.  According  to  that  doctrine,  the  family 


21 

is  not  indeed  exactly  a  state  of  sin  ;  but  it  is  a  degrada- 
tion. No  father,  no  mother  can  compare  in  dignity 
with  the  unmarried  priest  and  nun.  There  can  be  no 
holiness  in  the  family  altar.  If  one  wishes  to  worship 
at  a  holy  altar,  he  must  go  where  unmarried  priests  offi- 
ciate in  robes  canonical.  Who  does  not  see  that  such  a 
religion  degrades  the  family  ? — places  it  on  the  very  bor- 
ders of  a  vicious  life,  shorn  of  all  its  moral  dignity  and 
glory  ?  No  Wonder,  that  one  whose  views  of  domestic 
life  are  thus  vitiated  and  degraded  should  choose  for  a 
wife  a  heathen  or  a  savage.  And  accordingly,  wher- 
ever men  of  this  faith  have  formed  colonies  in  the 
wilderness,  this  result  has  followed  ;  and  it  will  follow 
in  the  future.  Society  is  thus  rotten  at  its  heart,  and 
what  can  it  do  but  languish  and  die,  as  it  does  in  all 
the  colonial  settlements  of  Catholic  Europe  ?  This  is 
the  sickness  of  which  it  languishes. 

How  different  the  influence  of  our  fathers'  faith! 
With  them  the  family  is  the  holiest  thing  on  earth. 
They  knew  nothing  of  an  altar  holier  than  the  family 
altar.  They  knew  no  priest  of  greater  sanctity  than  the 
father,  priest  of  his  own  house.  Oh  !  how  improbable 
that  a  man  of  such  a  faith  would  choose,  to  preside 
around  his  fire-side,  a  heathen  and  a  savage  !  No  !  he 
will  choose  a  cultivated  being,  a  Christ-like  spirit,  a 
blessed  heir  of  heaven.  Ah !  thanks  to  God,  the  family 
constituted  according  to  that  faith,  is  a  germ  of  christ- 
ian civilization,  which  never  can  die.  Place  such  a  fam- 
ily in  any  remote  wild  of  the  earth,  and  it  has  life  in  it- 
self; it  will  send  out  the  roots,  and  the  branches,  and 
the  seeds  of  a  christian  civilization,  which  will  cover 
the  hills,  and  make  glad  the  valleys  all  around  it.  And 
here  is  found  one  of  the  principal  sources  of  the  vital 
power  of  the  Anglo  American  emigrant.  Wherever 
such  a  family  is  planted  in  the  American  wilderness, 


23 

there  is  tlie  Church  of  Christ,  there  is  freedom,  there  is 
christian  civilization. 

And  God  be  forever  praised  for  the  American  Home 
Missionary  Society.  Its  function  is  to  follow  such  fam- 
ilies to  the  heart  of  the  Western  wilderness,  to  the 
banks  of  the  Columbia,  and  the  gold  fields  of  California, 
and  cheer,  and  encourage,  and  help  them  to  plant  the 
Church  of  Christ  in  those  primeval  solitudes. 

2.  Another  and  most  potent  cause  of  the  wonderful 
characteristics  of  American  emigration,  is  the  fact  that 
with  us  the  laborer  is  an  educated,  civilized  man.  It  is 
with  us  almost  alone,  that  the  thinking,  independent, 
self-poised,  and  self-responsible  mind,  is  united  in  the 
same  person  with  the  brawny  arm  and  hard  hand  of 
the  laborer.  Yet  this  is  a  condition  without  the  fulfill- 
ment of  which  the  phenomena  of  our  emigration  are  quite 
impossible.  The  wealthy,  the  high-born,  the  ruling 
classes  will  not  emigrate  to  the  wilderness.  They  enjoy 
far  greater  advantages  at  home,  than  the  wilderness, 
however  fertile  in  resources,  can  aflbrd  them.  If  the 
unpeopled  waste  is  to  be  reclaimed  and  made  the  home 
of  man,  it  must  be  by  those,  whose  lot  is  comparatively 
a  hard  one,  by  the  laboring  classes.  But  if  the  laboring 
classes  are  uneducated  barbarians,  as  has  been  the  fact 
in  most  other  countries,  they  will  be  destitute  of  that 
skill,  that  knowledge,  that  self-reliance,  without  which 
men  will  seldom  undertake  the  task  of  seeking  a  new 
home  in  the  wilds.  The  very  conception  of  a  migration 
to  Kansas,  or  Minnesota,  or  Oregon  implies  knowledge, 
resources,  self-reliance  in  a  very  high  degree.  And 
then,  again,  if  an  uncultivated,  uneducated,  laboring 
population  does  emigrate,  it  will  not  carry  civilization 
with  it.  It  has  it  not  to  carry.  Its  colonies  will  lan- 
guish for  ages  in  ignorance  and  barbarism. 

It  is  precisely  for  this  reason,  that  the  civilization  of 


28 

Greece  and  Rome  did  not  cover  Europe  and  Asia,  and 
fill  tliem  with  light,  and  leave  no  barbarians  to  destroy 
them,  and  thus  render  the  dark  ages  impossible.  The 
laborer,  the  only  man  who  would  emigrate  to  the  wilder- 
ness, was  too  ignorant  to  know  that  there  was  any 
wilderness,  and  too  barbarous  to  transplant  civilization. 
This  is  the  only  reason  why  Egypt  did  not  explore  and 
subdue  the  banks  of  the  Nile,  as  rapidly  as  we  do  those 
of  the  Mississippi  and  its  branches.  Talk  not  of  ma- 
laria— there  is  malaria  enough  in  the  dark,  damp,  prime- 
val forests  that  overhang  the  Mississippi,  the  Missouri, 
and  the  Illinois ;  but  it  is  no  barrier  to  the  progress  of 
the  civilized  laborer,  seeking  a  magnificent  home  for 
himself  and  his  posterity. 

The  same  consideration  furnishes  the  only  explanation 
of  the  fact  that,  though  Europe  is  at  this  day  swarming 
with  emigrants  from  almost  every  nation,  none  of  those 
nationalities,  except  the  English,  are  at  all  reproducing 
themselves  by  their  colonies.  Their  emigrants  are  all 
mingled,  absorbed,  and  lost  in  the  English  speaking  de- 
luge, which  is  encircling  the  globe.  The  reason  is,  that, 
for  the  most  part,  their  laborers  are  uncultivated  men, 
quite  incapable  of  carrying  civilization  and  freedom  into 
the  wilderness.  They  are  therefore  glad  to  avail  them- 
selves of  those  foundations,  which  our  emigrants  lay. 
They  are  absorbed  into  our  new  settlements,  and  rapidly 
lose  their  language  and  nationality. 

It  is  then  perfectly  obvious,  that  we  owe  our  power 
of  multiplying  civilized  communities  in  every  unpeopled 
spot  to  the  fact,  that  our  laboring  classes  are  educated, 
thinking,  self-reliant  men — as  De  Tocqueville  says  of 
them :  "  the  product  of  eighteen  centuries."  Whence, 
then,  this  characteristic  of  our  people  ?  Clearly,  from 
the  religion  of  our  fathers.  That  religion  is  the  only 
moral  force,  which  ever  has  educated  men  in  masses  as 


24 

men,  individually  responsible  to  God,  and  having  indi- 
vidual, inalienable  rights.  Take  your  stand  in  that  re- 
ligious faith,  and  knowledge — knowledge  of  God  through 
his  word  and  his  works,  knowledge  of  rights,  and  know- 
ledge of  duties  to  God  and  man — ^becomes  the  first 
want  of  every  human  soul.  No  child  will  grow  up  in 
ignorance  in  any  family  which  heartily  adopts  that  faith. 
A  community  which  is  pervaded  by  it,  will  effectively 
provide  for  the  education  of  every  child  within  its 
limits.  Education,  culture,  become  as  necessary  and  as 
universal,  as  air,  water,  or  sunlight.  This  faith  it  is, 
which  has  educated  the  American  laborer,  and  given 
him  his  power  to  make  the  wilderness  to  rejoice  and 
blossom  as  the  rose.  And  he  will  never  lose  this  power, 
till  he  loses  his  religion,  and,  therefore,  the  educating 
force  which  it  exerts. 

3.  The  only  remaining  cause  which  I  shall  mention  of 
the  characteristic  results  of  American  emigration  is,  the 
peculiar  public  spirit,  or,  if  I  may  so  call  it,  the  social 
constructiveness,  which  characterizes  the  American  emi- 
grant. This  results  directly  from  what  has  been  said, 
and  therefore  need  not  detain  us  long.  It  would  be 
difficult,  adequately  to  describe  the  rude  and  unsightly 
figure,  often  presented  by  a  company  of  American  emi- 
grants on  their  way  to  their  new  home  in  the  wilds.  It 
has  often  excited  the  derision  of  the  gay,  the  pleasure- 
loving,  and  the  proud.  But  any  one  who  well  knows 
that  group,  and  has  a  heart  to  appreciate  it,  will  look 
on  with  veneration,  ^neas  is  said  to  have  carried  the 
Trojan  household  gods  to  Italy.  Those  unsightly  wa- 
gons are  bearing  a  nobler  and  more  enduring  treasure, 
more  worthy  to  be  celebrated  in  the  immortal  epic,  than 
the  Trojan  Penates.  They  carry  no  material  image,  no 
external  emblem,  but  in  their  very  minds  and  hearts 
they  bear  along,  through  forest  and  prairie,  all  the  in- 


35 

stitutions  of  a  ripe  christian  civilization.  The  school- 
house,  the  college,  the  church,  the  teaching  ministry,  are 
all  traveling  in  those  rude  wagons  to  their  new  home 
in  the  wilderness.  At  Harvard  and  Yale,  college 
halls  stood  beneath  the  shade  of  the  primeval  forest ; 
and  to  this  day  it  is  the  peculiarity  of  the  American 
emigrant,  that  he  mingles  in  one  concert,  the  tolling  of 
the  college  bell,  the  howling  of  the  wolf,  and  the  crack 
of  the  huntsman's  rifle. 

Nor  is  it  needful  to  spend  time  to  prove,  that  this 
peculiarity  is  the  result  of  the  same  religious  system,  or 
that  all  other  colonizations  in  the  New  World  have  ut- 
terly failed,  for  the  want  of  this  very  social  construct- 
iveness.  Among  the  colonies  of  France,  of  Spain,  of 
Portugal,  you  look  for  it  in  vain ;  and  for  the  want  of 
it,  weakness  and  premature  old  age  and  decay,  mark 
all  their  settlements. 

I  tliink  now,  that  any  candid  man  will  admit,  that 
the  peculiar  and  wonderful  success  of  American  coloni- 
zation, is  to  be  ascribed,  almost  wholly,  to  these  three 
causes — the  purity  and  moral  dignity  of  the  family,  the 
education  and  culture  of  the  great  mass  of  oar  industri- 
ous population,  and  the  public  spirit,  the  social  con- 
structiveness,  which  distinguishes  us  from  all  other  peo- 
ples ;  and  that  these  three  causes  run  up  into  one — the 
religious  system  of  our  Puritan  fathers.  Then  must 
such  a  man  grant  aU  which  I  claim,  on  this  occasion, 
that,  so  far  as  that  religious  system  prevails^  so  far  will 
this  American  people  retain  their  power  of  expanding 
themselves  over  the  earth.  So  far  as  this  system  pre- 
vails, it  will  cause  that "  every  one  that  is  feeble  among 
the  people  shall  be  as  David,  and  the  house  of  David 
as  God,  as  the  angel  of  the  Lord  before  them." 

Let  us  suppose  that  the  whole  present  territory  of 
the  United  States  were  filled  with  such  a  people,  num- 


26 

bering,  as  it  inevitalbly  must,  not  less  than  three  hun- 
dred millions — every  family  a  fortress  of  social  strength, 
every  laborer  an  educated,  civilized,  relf-reliant  man, 
conscious  of  his  duties  and  his  rights,  every  com- 
munity rejoicing  in  those  institutions,  which  provide 
for  universal  culture — with  what  power  would  such  a 
people  extend  its  arms  to  the  North  and  the  South,  to 
the  East  and  the  West,  to  take  hold  of  and  subdue  an 
unpeopled  world.  Its  colonial  settlements  would  be 
found  on  every  unoccupied  spot,  where  a  furrow  could  be 
turned  on  a  tillable  soil,  wherever  there  was  a  water-fall 
to  turn  machinery.  Every  wilderness  and  solitary 
place  would  be  glad  for  them,  every  desert  would  bud 
and  blossom  as  the  rose. 

And  why  should  we  despair,  that  this  grand  concep- 
tion may  be,  in  some  good  degree,  realized  ?    To  a  re- 
sult so  sublime,  the  settlement  of  our  religious  fathers 
on  these  shores  evidently  looked.    If  I  may  so  speak,  it 
seems  evidently  to  have  been  God's  plan.     And  shall 
we  be  like  the  faithless  one  of  old,  who  said,  if  there 
were  windows  in  heaven,  then  might  this  thing  be? 
Shall  we  not  rather  believe  that  God  can  and  will  ac- 
complish what  he  has  undertaken  ?    True,  slavery  now 
holds  half  our  States  in  bondage.     But  may  we  not 
believe  that  this  giant  iniquity  will  be  swept  away, 
before   this  inevitable  current  of  Christian   freedom? 
The  time  is  near — it  will  perhaps  be  in  the  days  of 
some  child  in  this  house  —  when  every  foot  of  our 
national  domain  will  be  wanted  for  the  free  laborer; 
and  slave  labor  can  not  long  hold  it  against  such  a 
competition.    Already,  are  there  unmistakable  signs, 
that  freedom  is  dawning  upon  the  fertile  plains  and 
iron  hills  of  Missouri.    It  is  not  alone  to  recent  political 
events  that  I  allude  ;  though  these  are  of  a  character  to 
enlist  the  sympathies  of  the  patriot,  and  the  prayers  of 


the  Christian ;  but  I  refer  still  more  especially  to  the 
amazing  relative  increase  of  her  free  population,  result- 
ing from  causes  so  deep  and  permanent,  so  entirely  pro- 
vidential, that  her  politicians  have  little  power,  either 
to  accelerate  or  retard  it. 

Nor  can  slavery  long  protect  itself  from  destruction, 
by  the  same  cause — the  inevitable  inroads  of  free  labor, 
all  along  its  northern  border.  Virginia — glorious  old 
Virginia,  amid  whose  sunny  hill-sides  holy  Mount  Ver- 
non nestles,  must  yet  again  be  free,  and  extend,  as  of 
old,  the  unshackled  hand  to  her  brothers  of  the  North, 
in  carrying  religion  and  freedom  over  the  continent. 
Time  would  fail  me,  to  discuss  this  subject.  Let  us 
trust  in  God  and  take  courage.  I  can  not  believe,  that 
God  has  doomed  one  half  the  soil  of  this  home  of  the 
free  to  perpetual  slavery.  There  is  ground  for  hope — 
the  time  of  deliverance  may  be  near.  Room  for  expan- 
sion is  as  much  a  necessity  of  our  free  laboring  popula- 
tion, as  air  or  sunlight.  The  days  of  plenty  of  cheap 
fertile  land,  easily  accessible  and  protected  from  the 
curse  of  slavery  by  nsitionalfaith  and  national  law,  are 
drawing  to  an  end.  Nothing  will  then  remain,  but  the 
living  stream  which  for  half  a  century,  has  been  rolling 
on  towards  the  North  West  must  flow  down  upon  the 
border  Slave  States,  and  spread  itself  over  lands  which 
slavery  can  never  cultivate.  The  free  laborers  will  not 
leave  three  fourths  of  the  lands  of  the  adjacent  slave- 
holding  States  to  lie  forever  uncultivated.  Freedom 
will  want  those  lands ;  and  it  will  have  them :  for  in 
this  country,  no  law  can  hinder,  that  the  owner  of 
unoccupied  land  should  enrich  himself  by  its  sale. 
Whenever,  therefore,  the  free  laborer  wants  those  lands, 
he  can  have  them.  This  seems  to  me  a  providential 
cause  which  dooms  slavery. 


28 

^  It  may,  however,  be  thouglit  by  some,  tliat  the  ra- 
pidity of  our  growth  and  expansion  must  soon  be  great- 
ly diminished  by  the  failure  of  foreign  immigration.  I 
shall  not  devote  much  time  to  this  part  of  the  subject, 
but  only  make  two  or  three  brief  suggestions. 

It  may  seem  to  some,  that  the  sooner  it  fails,  the  bet- 
ter for  our  hopes.  But  I  think  we  may  safely  leave 
this  point  in  the  hands  of  the  Divine  Architect  of  our 
national  destiny.  He  has,  evidently,  designs  much 
more  comprehensive,  than  merely  to  build  up  a  great 
free  religious  nation  out  of  the  direct  descendants  of 
our  pious  ancestry.  The  leaven  of  their  principles  is 
about  being  mingled  with  a  mass  almost  as  mighty  and 
heterogeneous  as  that  through  which  Christianity  was 
diffused,  in  the  ages  that  succeeded  that  of  the  Apostles. 
And  God  knows  best,  with  how  much  meal  it  is  safe  to 
mingle  it.  The  leaven  shall  not  be  lost ;  it  shall  not 
lose  its  power ;  the  whole  shall  be  leavened.  Nor  can 
I  see  anywhere  the  indication,  that  the  religious  charac- 
ter of  the  American  people,  is  to  be  materially  modi- 
fied by  the  accession  of  these  foreign  elements.  There 
is  evidence,  on  the  other  hand,  that  they  are  themselves 
undergoing  a  process  of  assimilation,  unequalled  in  all 
the  past.  Scarcely  any  portion  of  the  social  structure, 
is  so  sensitive  to  foreign  influence,  as  its  language. 
Where,  then,  is  the  evidence  that  the  English  language 
is  to  be  either  supplanted  among  us  by  foreign  influence, 
or  permanently  corrupted  ?  Assimilation  in  language, 
is  a  type,  and  only  a  type,  of  the  universal  assimilation 
that  is  going  on.  Nor  can  I  forbear  remarking,  that  the 
influence  of  foreign  immigration  in  increasing  the  rapid- 
ity of  our  growth,  is,  in  my  opinion,  greatly  overrated. 
The  ratio  of  our  increase  has,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  been  but 
little  greater,  when  foreign  immigration  was  greatest, 
than  when  it  was  least.    And  whilst  these  ever-increas- 


29 

ing  American  communities  continue,  as  now,  to  present 
to  the  needy  and  oppressed  populations  of  Europe,  in- 
viting prospects  of  freedom,  wealth,  and  plenty,  it  may 
be  expected  that  foreign  immigration  will  increase, 
rather  than  diminish.  I  see  no  reason  to  apprehend, 
either  that  we  are  to  be  relieved  of  foreign  immigra- 
tion, if  it  is  an  evil,  or  to  be  deprived  of  it,  if  a  benefit. 
This  topic  is  one  of  great  interest  and  great  importance, 
but  want  of  time  forbids  my  dwelling  upon  it  now. 

I  do  not,  then,  pretend  to  set  any  definite  limits  to 
the  growth  of  our  population,  or  to  utter  any  definite 
prediction.  But  I  do  say  that,  on  the  supposition  that 
the  religious  principles  of  our  Fathers  can  be  made  to 
prevail  coextensively  with  the  migrations  of  our  free 
population,  I  can  see  no  cause  which  is  likely,  in  any 
great  degree,  to  impair  the  rapidity  of  our  increase  for 
the  next  one  hundred  and  fifty  years.  There  is  no  fear 
of  want  of  room — an  unpeopled  earth  aflbrds  room 
enough.  All  the  causes  of  our  unparalleled  growth 
hitherto,  originated  only  in  the  pervading  influence  of  a 
pure  Christianity ;  and  provided  the  prevalence  of  these 
principles  be  made  coextensive  with  our  growth,  may 
act  with  just  as  much  energy  upon  hundreds  of  millions 
as  upon  a  few  thousands. 

With  these  things  in  view,  I  can  not  help  regarding 
this  power  of  the  American  people,  to  extend  itself 
over  unpeopled  wilds  and  multiply  with  such  amazing 
rapidity  christian  communities  and  nations,  as  a  cause 
which  looks  quite  beyond  all  our  vast  national  domain, 
with  all  the  hundreds  of  millions  it  is  capable  of  sus- 
taining, and  as  promising  to  exert  a  controlling  influence 
on  the  religious  destinies  of  the  globe. 

The  depth  and  solemnity  of  this  conviction  is  greatly 
enhanced,  when'  I  take  in  the  additional  fact,  that  our 
own  dear  mother  England,  (she  ought  to  be  called  the 


30 

motlier  of  nations,)  is  spreading  abroad  her  own  colo- 
nial settlements,  largely  composed  of  materials  kindred 
to  our  own,  in  almost  every  quarter  of  the  globe. 
English  and  American  emigration  is  sweeping  over 
North  America  in  parallel  lines.  If  the  population  of 
British  America  is  less  than  our  own,  it  is  probably  in- 
creasing with  no  less  rapidity ;  and  evidently  has  open 
before  it  a  most  magnificent  future.  In  the  Indian  Ar- 
chipelago, New  Zealand,  and  the  thousand  islands  of  the 
Pacific,  the  English  human  current  from  the  west,  and 
the  American  from  the  east,  are  soon  to  meet,  and  min- 
gle their  kindred  waters. 

It  is  true,  then,  beyond  controversy  or  doubt,  that 
the  migrations  of  the  English  language,  the  spread  of 
the  old  English  stock,  by  peaceful  colonization,  over  the 
unpeopled  world,  is  the  grandest  phenomenon  now  visi- 
ble on  earth :  it  is  the  mightiest  visible  agency,  which 
God  is  now  employing,  to  change  the  religious  and  so- 
cial condition  of  the  human  race,  and  plant  the  Christ- 
ian religion  over  the  world.  To  make  England  and 
America  thoroughly  Christian,  is  to  fill  the  world  with 
the  knowledge  of  the  Lord.  It  is  to  plant  the  Gospel 
of  Jesus  Christ  in  every  land,  before  the  year  of  our 
Lord,  2000. 

When  I  have  reached  this  stand-point,  I  seem  almost 
audibly  to  hear  the  same  voice,  that  said :  "  Go  not  into 
the  way  of  the  Gentiles,  into  any  city  of  the  Samaritans 
enter  ye  not ;"  and  urging  in  our  ears,  go  teach,  teach^ 
TEACH,  the  English  and  American  emigrant.  Let  every 
emigrant's  wagon  that  crosses  the  prairie,  be  a  sanctuary 
of  God ;  let  the  voice  of  christian  prayer  and  praise 
ascend  from  the  cabin  of  every  steamer  on  the  Western 
waters ;  let  the  christian  minister  and  christian  teach- 
er accompany  the  woodman,  the  hunter,  and  the  gold- 


31 

digger,  to  the  wilderness ;  build  the  church  and  the 
school-house,  wherever  the  squatter  builds  his  cabin ; 
and  the  earth  shall  soon  be  the  Lord's,  and  the  fullness 
thereof.  Before  our  grandchildren  go  to  their  graves, 
the  triumphant  song  shall  go  up :  "  The  kingdoms  of 
this  world  are  become  kingdoms  of  our  Lord  and  his 
Christ." 

But  let  us  remember,  that  this  is  not  the  hour  of 
triumph  and  victory,  but  of  mighty,  and,  to  human 
eyes,  dubious  conflict.  There  is  no  doctrine  of  manifest 
destiny  here.  The  Jews  had  a  manifest  destiny  ;  but 
of  that  destiny,  as  a  nation,  they  failed.  We  may  fail 
too ;  and  if  so,  our  failure  will  be  the  most  signal  in 
history.  The  passer-by  will  exclaim :  "  O  Lucifer !  son 
of  the  morning,  how  art  thou  fiallen !"  Worldliness 
may  invade  our  churches,  and  set  up  the  altar  of  Mam- 
mon, in  the  temple  of  God.  Our  migrations  may  be- 
come entirely  divested  of  the  religious  element.  Our 
emigrants  may  go  to  the  wilderness  only  for  gain,  and 
leave  their  Penates  behind  them.  Our  ministers  may 
be  too  fond  of  ease  and  comfort  and  refined  literary 
leisure,  to  follow  the  emigrant  to  his  wild  home.  The 
members  of  our  churches  may  become  too  covetous  and 
too  fond  of  the  ostentations  of  fashionable  life,  to  sus- 
tain the  cause  of  Home  Missions,  along  our  ever-reced- 
ing border.  Our  frontier  may  thus  be  inhabited  by  a 
people  knowing  no  God  but  money,  and  no  freedom 
but  that  of  licentiousness.  And  no  man  well  acquainted 
with  our  recent  new  settlements,  can  help  feeling  a  sick- 
ness of  heart,  at  the  symptoms  of  such  moral  disease 
seizing  on  these  extremities  of  the  body  politic.  Let 
us  not  deceive  ourselves.  If  such  a  day  ever  comes, 
our  glory  will  have  departed. 

We  can  no  more  subdue  a  continent  by  an  emigrant 
population  without  religion,  without  the  Church,  the 


32 

school,  tlie  ministry,  than  Kome  could  hold  on  in  her 
career  of  conquest,  with  the  enervated  legions  of  the 
latter  years  of  the  Empire.  If  such  a  day  ever  comes, 
we  shall  stand  before  the  other  nations  of  the  world, 
despite  our  boasted  Anglo  Saxon  blood,  like  Samson 
before  the  Philistines,  when  his  locks  were  shorn. 

This  effort  to  plant  the  institutions  of  free  christian 
society  upon  the  borders  of  the  ever  receding  wilder- 
ness demands  the  united  and  earnest  cooperation  of  all^ 
in  every  portion  of  this  land,  who  love  and  cherish  the 
faith  of  our  fathers.  It  is  sometimes  asked,  when  are 
the  churches  of  the  old  States  to  be  relieved  from  these 
demands  for  aid  to  the  new  settlements  ?  When  ? 
Never — till  either  these  churches  shall  have  utterly 
apostatized  from  Christ,  or  there  shall  be  no  more  un- 
peopled wilderness  on  earth,  to  which  the  American 
emigrant  can  penetrate  ;  NEVEE.,  till  this  living  stream 
shall  have  flowed  round  the  earth,  and  planted  the 
Church  of  Christ  on  every  sunny  hill-side,  and  in  every 
fertile  valley.  The  American  Home  Missionary  Society^ 
in  prospect  of  the  immediately  coming  future,  has  as 
truly  the  world  for  its  field,  as  the  American  Board  of 
Commissioners  for  Foreign  Missions.  And  if  any  who 
have  put  their  hand  to  the  plow  are  disposed  now  to 
look  back,  they  are  unworthy  of  any  part  in  this  work. 
The  missionaries  of  this  Society  shall  yet  follow  the 
American  emigrant,  not  only  to  all  the  fertile  valleys 
which  nestle  among  the  snowy  peaks  of  Oregon,  and  to 
all  the  gold  fields  of  California,  but  to  the  table  lands 
of  Mexico,  to  the  banks  of  the  Amazon,  the  Orinoco, 
and  the  La  Plata,  and  to  all  the  thousand  islands  of 
the  Pacific.  This  is  the  time  for  girding  on  the  harness, 
not  for  putting  it  off. 

And  I  can  not  forbear  saying,  in  conclusion,  that  our 
Home  Missionary  enterprise  ought  to  be  a  great  deal 


"y'VERSITY  OF  ILUNOIS^JRBANA 


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